Milwaukee filmmakers you need to know

Time to do a quick roll call of Milwaukee filmmakers doing their thing, on their own dime, completely outside of the Film Wisconsin Tax Bill hype (is that even news anymore?) – just creatives being creative. Please link up and let us know about your fave Brew City filmmaker on our REEL Milwaukee blog that lives at vitalsourcemag.com.

Sona Voice – This dude means business. His documentary, Behold Something Bigger than Tupac, is a tale surrounding the life of a man (THE VOICE) from a different continent who sees himself as being greater than (in his opinion) the greatest rapper ever, Tupac Amaru Shakur. That’s a whole lotta greatness being addressed. Check their website for screenings and throw your hat into the being greater than the greatest rap debate. biggerthantupac.com

Buckley Brothers – The jury is still out on these guys. To their credit, they produced and shot a feature film called Jake’s How-To right here in ole Milwaukee. It seems like they are doing the whole “go to LA, come back to Milwaukee on a white horse, shoot a feature film for peanuts, premiere it at the Oriental, soak up praise, hit up Northshore parents for money, go back to LA” thing. Bully for them. But wait! In an August 13, 2008 interview with onmilwaukee.com, co-director Vincent Buckley said “Milwaukee isn’t a film town. Most here don’t understand how the film business works. Not to mention there are not many talented people here.” I know I’m not your PR agent but let’s have our first and last meeting right now. Douchebag Brothers, when you are trying to feed off the hometown, root for the underdog vibe, don’t look down your nose and insult the city’s intelligence and its art/film talent pool in one arrogant, self-important swoop. Way to shit the bed, dude. The jury is back. Verdict: You Suck. buckleybrothers.com

Caroline Kastelic – I’ll just put this out there: I have a thing for chick animators. It’s the same reason I still play guitar along with the entire Weezer blue album, dig Harry Potter books, love the internet, and seeing ads for (not going to mind you, just the ads for) the Renaissance Faire – it’s my inner dork guiding my pop culture compass. Caroline recently graduated from UW-Milwaukee with a BFA in Film (with a focus on motion animation). and teaches a class at UWM called “Concepts in Media Arts Production.” She is currently working on a music video with the Wisconsin band Hired Geeks (show at Turner Hall September 12 – myspace.com/hiredgeeks), for their new song “Here We Are.” The video is scheduled to be completed in the next month. Cool. ckastelicfilms.com

Josh Rosenberg – This fella graduated from the University of Wisconsin- Milwaukee in 2006. He wrote and directed the awardwinning documentary Civilian Soldiers, which won the Student Category of the Detroit Docs International Film Festival. It also was shown at the Wisconsin Film Festival. He spent summer 2006 working directly with filmmaker Niels Mueller (Swimfan, The Assassination of Richard Nixon) in Los Angeles. In just three weeks he wrote the screenplay for the feature film Tracks, which includes songs from Dovemanan, an artist Pitchfork gives an 8.0, so you know its kinda the shit. tracksfilm.com

Milwaukee Itself – Sorry. Just had to add this in. Go to You Tube, search Milwaukee, scroll down and you’ll find this little gem: Eddie Van Halen Solo 1980. Just the sick ‘80s metal hair and signature Jackson Pollack taped-up guitar is enough include it in this article. Behold:

Howie Goldklang – Yeah, that’s me. Hey, I’m a filmmaker too, so you bet your ass I will self-promote at the stroke of a keyboard. I won Best Local Filmmaker Awards in 2004 and 2005 from Shepherd Express although it is not exactly clear why; my short film God Knows Your Lonely Soul was shot on a budget of $99 and won some awards and screened at a whole mess of film festivals; I was hired by the Violent Femmes to shoot a documentary covering their 25th anniversary tour and about six months into project the bass player freaked out when “Blister In The Sun” was in a Wendy’s fast food commercial so he sued the singer for royalties dating back 25 years and our little film got stubbed out like a cigarette. There is a cool trailer floating around on YouTube somewhere called American Music – An Acoustic Punk Documentary. Currently, I am in pre-production on a feature film I’m writing and directing called Ask Me
Tomorrow, which is slated for a July 2009 shoot in Milwaukee. Holler! Now someone lend me $500,000. establishmentproductions.com/film.htmlVS